Sunday, May 27, 2007

The other side of the coin

I finally found someone who doesn't like Raleigh. My coworker Jen, a 24-year-old Austin, TX native, is not happy here. But her set of criteria is quite different than mine. She's the kind of girl who likes to go to bars and clubs to drink and listen to live music. Those activities are at the rock bottom of my list of fun things to do. She says that in Austin, the downtown area is highly concentrated with over a hundred bars and clubs in just a few blocks. They always have live music, and it's super easy to just walk from one place to the next to keep the party going, so to speak. Whereas here in Raleigh, from what I've been told, while the downtown area has many bars, most don't feature live music, and they are not all clumped together for convenience. So, I guess if that's your scene, Raleigh is not the place for you.

Luckily for me, that is most definitely not my scene, and I am very happy here. I'm loving my house more each day. Except for the pesky lawn. I would be totally fine with the mowing and such if only it would grow green! But it's all brown and ugly (in the front yard, which I never sit in by my neighbors have to look at). Many yards in my neighborhood are the same, so I don't feel quite so bad, but many are lush, and I am so envious. I really need a gardener to get everything up to speed so I can just take over a well-oiled machine. But when it comes to gardening, I'm clueless, as my father can attest. I have some lovely native plants in the backyard (which pessimists call weeds) that I think are perfect.

They are green and lush, and require no watering on my part to grow. But I've been told to yank them up or I will regret it in the long run. I used a string trimmer for the first time yesterday. It really made such a difference around the edges of my lawn, up against the house and along the brick trim where you can't reach with a lawnmower. Slowly but surely I'm learning, but I hope everything doesn't die before I get the hang of it!

I do have some sources of pride in my backyard; namely, the magnolia tree and the daylilies. Granted, I had to do nothing to make these bloom, but I'm still proud to see them in my own backyard.